What are you doing with your letters?

Those beautiful three letters came at a price. For weeks, sometimes months, those letters were either hot to touch, heavy to hold or hurt your eyes to stare upon. Now, you broadcast to the world your affiliation in Sigma or Zeta, you iron your shirt before wearing it, dry clean it, hang it carefully in the closet, pass it on to those who are (in your sight) "worthy" of wearing it or create a shrine in your house to the organization (I personally have a "wall" consisting of my "PBS support the million man march" poster, a staff, my crescent, 3 paddles, 1 t-shirt, 2 rocks from the Alpha Chapter plot, 7 hats (YES SEVEN), my certificate (no. 86815) a Crescent Moon mini-billboard that soror Rhonda Lee made for me , some souvenirs from my "process",and it's still growing).

We adhere to unwritten rules and social mores such as not drinking or smoking while wearing letters, we frown upon non-members who touch our medallions, keychains, canes, etc....

No offense to those who came in through intake, but those of you who pledged can feel me on everything I just typed. For those of you who hold this type of reverence for your letters, those three letters on your membership cards, branded on your arm/leg/chest are truly branded on your heart and will be there till your heart ceases to beat. So now the big question revolves around what are you doing with your letters now that you have them??

It was July 3, 1997 at the World Marriott in Orlando, right after the stepshow about 30 minutes into the afterparty. Cane in hand, hyper as ever, I was party stepping. Finally, I saw a line going around the end of the stage and thought to myself "hey I know that step!!", so off I ran to join that line. Unfortunately, some moron from the hotel left (of all things) a COFFEE MUG/CUP in the ailse. In my haste to get to the line, I stepped down incorrectly on the mug (is there a "correct" way to step on a coffee mug?) and a few trips later, found myself on the floor in very intense pain with my now severly sprained ankle swelling up to the size of an elephant's foot. A few dozen frat and sorors came over to help (THANK YOU LAURA!!); others just hung around and peeped through, trying to find out what was going on (by the way Nigel, I found my cane- Aundre had it- THANKS).

One soror (who's name I can't remember) helped place my foot in a bag of ice (which hurt even worse than the sprain). We needed something to hold the bag on- just tying the bag wasn't keeping it on. Finally, one member of the stepteam from Cheney University, took his shirt off---- his shirt with his beautiful Phi Beta Sigma letters across it--- his shirt that he just stepped in and wore proudly on stage as he represented--- and wrapped it around the top of the bag, securing it in place. Someone told him "Frat, what are you doing? Your letters....", to which he shook his head in a "no" motion and said "Man, this is my frat brother."

This brother realized two great truths that slip past many older brothers during political games and many younger brothers in the midst of undergraduate life- your letters are just that- letters. They don't mean a damn thing until you put them into practice. Until you do this, your letters are just a decoration- something to put in your shrine to Sigma/Zeta/Whatever- a way and a means for you to get "hookups" by "leaning on the shield" but never giving back.

Many of us talk about the ideals and history of the organization and how much we want to bring in people who will work for the organization as well as how we don't want no "paper" frat and sorors- we engineer long complicated "underground" (cuz there is no such thing as an "underground line") pledge processes (hey, it's the truth- you'll only hear the truth on this page- y'all know I ain't politically correct) designed to make real brothers and sorors and in most cases, they are quite successful- the problem is, we don't follow up. An inactive frat or soror is about as much use to the organization as somebody who pledged for a few weeks and dropped line.

For the record, that brother that gave up his shirt was Shaka from Cheney University (MAD LOVE TO YOU FRAT). That shirt that he gave me proudly hangs upon my wall as a souvenir and a reminder of the difference between just wearing your letters and actually doing something with them.

By Brother Kerry Gilliard